The Christmas Story…as it should be…
Even Better Than Linus
24 Saturday Dec 2011
Posted in Children, Christianity, Christmas, Gospel, Salvation
Category Archives: Children
Scenes From The Back Row
12 Monday Dec 2011
Posted in Children, Christianity, Commitment, Disability, Encouragement, Faithfulness, Family, Hope, Intimacy, Marriage, Sandy, Sex, Shepherd Center, Suffering, Trials
If you’ve followed my blog for the past several years, you know I have referenced Shepherd chapels before. Then, it was the endearing love of a mother for her newly and severely disabled son. Go ahead and read that account. It’s definitely tissue-worthy.
What a mother. A certifiable hero.
Today I was doing a bit of spying again from the back row during chapel and set my sights on a wife and her disabled husband a couple of seats in front of me. Again the homily from an over-trained but well-intentioned chaplain was dry and unaffecting, failing to connect with the core needs of the audience. But never fear, the real sermons happen all around you at a Shepherd chapel. That’s where the scenes and sounds of glory take place. So it pays to sit on the back row sometimes.
But for the record, and as a pastor, I wouldn’t encourage it.
This afternoon’s message came from the pair in the photo. Danny, like the son in the aforementioned story, is a quadriplegic. He cannot move his arms. He would have to be assisted just to give his wife a hug and, even then, would not feel the warmth of her body.
I don’t yet know Dan
ny’s story but I know enough that he was able-bodied when he got married to this woman, and now he moves his chair by blowing into a straw. I wish you could see this marvelous woman love on her man, checking every few seconds to see if there’s anything he needs, jumping up to wipe the spittle from the corner of his mouth, smiling at him just to assure him that he is still the man she married, albeit diminished, and would marry him all over again.
That is truly heroic if you ask me.
I am sniveling as I think of the Sandy’s and Mrs. Danny’s and the mommy’s who rarely get the attention they deserve. We are the victims of fortunately unfortunate circumstances and they are the angels, the saviors, the heroes.
Check out the body language of this wife who, I’ve no doubt, will grow old with her husband through sickness and health. Take careful note that she is seated on a white folding chair, but occupies only half of it—the half closest to Danny. She wants to be as near to him as the space between a wooden chair and a wheelchair will allow. It’s like they were teenagers in love in a movie theater. This is intimacy. Have your Hollywood sex all you want.
I remain transfixed by the love story unfolding before me. Sure there will be new adjustments and—yes—those dratted, humiliating physical limitations, but I applaud this heroic woman for rolling with the punches and braving whatever lies ahead.
I know about heroes. I live with one. If you want to read about Sandy and our amazing love story, scroll down the right margin of my blog to “Categories” and look for “Sandy” in the drop-down menu. Our story is well documented and you’ll get the picture. It’ll make you mist over too.
So…hat tips to the families, the wives, the moms and dads…of all who suffer…
…oh, and to the Emily’s (whose athletic sixteen year old brother became a quad a few months ago and ministers to him as tenderly as if she were his own mother).
From where I sit? You guys are the true heroes. Bless you.
Light In Room 426
08 Thursday Dec 2011
Posted in Children, Christianity, Compassion, Faithfulness, Forgiveness, Freedom, Hope, Intercession, Prayer, Prodigal, Waiting on God, Wisdom, Worship
Why am I at the Shepherd Center these four weeks?
I may not know the full answer to that yet, but I do have an idea.
I just prayed with one of the nurses here in my room, asking God to give her and her husband wisdom to know how to proceed with their adopted daughter. Nine years ago, a little girl was brought into their home who had horrific baggage (later learned) and tendencies. So violent was her Type 2 bi-polar disorder (the worst classification) their own daughter had to sleep with two locks on her door, as she seems to be the burning core of Cassie’s (not her real name) hatred.
This morning, Cassie bounded down the steps of their home walked straight up to her mother, and threw her arms around my nurse friend and told her she loved her. Totally unsolicited.
It had never happened before. In nine years.
This gallant adoptive mother broke down as she shared that, in her heart, she knew Cassie is experiencing a major breakthrough and on the road to healing. I could see years of fear, hysteria, hopelessness and exhaustion just melt away with those wracking sobs and a face that suddenly lost its lines and looked young again.
On this same day she found out that a Medicare-underwritten program has finally accepted their daughter after months of waiting and wringing of hands. After months of crying out for God to heal the pain in the home and torment in their daughter.
Then, this:
“I love you Mom.”
Can you think of four better words?
So my friend is torn. What if this is God’s witness to her that their daughter, after endless therapy and new medicine–not to mention the steady stream of prayers–is showing a monumental turnaround? What would it mean for them to put her in the program?
If they do not drive Cassie the hundred miles to a new rehabilitation center, they will receive no financial assistance for any of their daughter’s future therapy.
I didn’t have a word for my friend, but instead turned to the Word on behalf of my friend. “Dear God, you promised that if we lack wisdom, we can ask of You, and we have the assurance that You will pour out such wisdom without restraint, without guilting us or remonstrating us for lack of faith…”
With heads bowed in this room, we agreed that the Father loves Cassie and has an incredible plan for not only her but for my friend, her husband and their other daughter. We prayed with boldness knowing that God would lift whatever fog or gauzy mist shielded the Johnson’s (not their real name) eyes that they might see He who is true Wisdom, Jesus the Christ.
She wiped her eyes and hugged me and told me her dad had phoned her this morning and used the promise of James 1:5 for those who lack wisdom in their conversation also. The Word had given His word after all. Her eyes were wide with expectation, relief and settled confidence that all would be well.
As I finished that last sentence, my nurse friend just passed my room with a beaming smile. This is why Jesus has come into the world, to set captives (like Cassie—and hurting families) free.
Where Did All These Children Come From?
13 Monday Jul 2009
Posted in Children, Christianity, Church, Encouragement, Faithfulness, Hearing God, Prophecy
“The river is rising
The river is rising, oh…
I feel it, I feel it, I feel it in my bones
I just don’t think I can hold it anymore…”
–Michael W. Smith, The River Is Rising
I relished the vantage point I had this morning—a fine, hot, deep south summer morning—on the lower platform of New River as I looked out on a congregation of people I mostly did not recognize. It was Sunday, and we were, as many people erroneously like to say, “at church.” Stretched from front row to back and side to side, quite nearly every seat in the house was filled with strangers. On this day, technically, they were visitors. Most fellowships might have a handful of visitors on a given week, but we had hundreds. A pastor’s dream.
Was I dreaming?
If I was, it gets even stranger.
The people who filled New River on this day had completely taken over the worship service and were conducting it in their own way. And I, as pastor, let them.
What gives?
It was all so very surreal. People I did not know. Their presence prevented our regular congregants from attending. They let me share, but only briefly, and when I did, a young man stood beside me to make sure I got it right. When their leaders stepped up, the few of us that braved being there could only hear them speak in some sort of strange code. But the code was beautiful and rich, ancient and, well, heroic.
From my perspective, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss a Sunday morning like this for all the tea in China.
Indeed, I and many others had prayed for such a thing.
There was prophecy behind it.
So, as I sat for those few seconds waiting for microphone issues to be hurriedly resolved, I merely looked out on the scene with awe and a welling tide gathering in my chest. These…these…beautiful intruders had captivated my heart with their smiles and humble visages and the only way I can describe what I was feeling in that heaven-soaked moment is the sense of a river rising and gushing in my spirit.
The mystery is solved when you realize our fellowship gladly gave up its own worship time so that a Ukrainian congregation might experience the space and comfort of our facilities. The young man who stood by me wasn’t actually censoring my words but interpreting them for the audience. Our leaders and their leaders had been in prayer and dialogue about this very possibility for weeks. They’ve been crammed onto less than an acre of property which included parking, a worship center and classrooms for one hundred and fifty children plus men and women. We got “wind” of it at a time when the Lord had been revealing to the eldership how we New Riverites might be a “people outside the camp” (Hebrews 13:13):
- out of the norm
- laying down our lives for the BODY of Christ in our area
- posturing ourselves to serve and not look to be served
- giving preference
- relinquishing our rights
- living out this “other life” as put forth in the Sermon of sermons (Matthew 5-7)
So…
When the plight of our Ukrainian brethren was brought to our attention, God began downloading revelation to our spirits in a hurry. He reminded us that the twenty-plus acres we sat on had been deeded to us, free and clear, paid in full, buildings and all. He further reminded us that it was not ours, but we’ve been asked to steward it for Him.
And when God asks, “What’s in your hand?” you just know He means to use it. Whatever “it” is.
And we don’t get a vote.
Way back in the late 1990′s, two fellowships merged into one. A Baptist church and a non-denominational church met at the altar one November evening and said, “I do” to one another and it was done. Through the earlier decades, several “church splits” had given Christ a black eye on that property, but for once there would not be a split but something new.
Words of a marvelous prophetic nature were spoken into this fledgling congregation back then and one of the most enigmatic yet intriguing was directly from the Hebrew scriptures:
19 “For your waste and desolate places and your destroyed land–
Surely now you will be too cramped for the inhabitants,
And those who swallowed you will be far away.
20″The children of whom you were bereaved will yet say in your ears,
‘The place is too cramped for me;
Make room for me that I may live here.’
21″Then you will say in your heart,
‘Who has begotten these for me,
Since I have been bereaved of my children
And am barren, an exile and a wanderer?
And who has reared these?
Behold, I was left alone;
From where did these come?’”
(Isaiah 49)
I wish you could have seen what I was seeing this morning.
Have you ever been in a place and suddenly realize, “this looks familiar…I seem to remember and yet it is new…”?
It hit me as I surveyed the many chairs and mother’s arms filled with children, babies playing in the aisles and a great many strollers parked alongside rows. I was seeing prophecy fulfilled.
Where did all these come from?
It doesn’t matter.
God brought them. And I have every confidence there’s more where these came from!
The message of the hour was clear: the River is rising. It’s rising. It’s rising. Can you feel it in your bones?
And then there was this great Truth:
WHAT I SAY I WILL DO, I WILL DO. COUNT ON IT.
Even if you have to wait twenty-five years, Abraham. Or four hundred and thirty years, Israel.
Take it from me, beloved. Whatever “it” is that you’ve been waiting for in Christ, is on its way. If you’ve heard, God will bring it to pass. Mind you, you might be standing right smack dab in the middle of its unfolding when it dawns on you, but just be aware. One day, perhaps when you least expect it, you’ll whip your head around to the out-of-the-clear-blue sounds of coos, cries and giggles. Then you’ll know…
It won’t be annoying or bothersome, either. It will be the new thing He has birthed and you’ll give your life for it because He placed it in your lap. One look into it’s face and your hooked. Ah, yes, it was painful getting there and still there are some long, sleepless nights ahead, fevers to attend to along with scraped knees and bad nightmares, but you won’t care.
Get the nursery ready. Oh, and you may need a bigger house, too.
An Apologetic Against Abortion
26 Friday Oct 2007
“How beautiful are the feet of them who bring good news…”
Photoshopped? Perhaps. I don’t know. But can you deny the power of Baby Samuel’s grasping hand? High-five, little buddy!
15:20
16 Thursday Aug 2007
Posted in Brokenness, Children, Christianity, Compassion, Encouragement, Family, Forgiveness, Gospel, Hope, Jesus Christ, Miracles, Reign of Christ, Repentance, Revival
“And he got up and went to his father. But while he was still far away, his father saw him and was moved with pity for him and went quickly and took him in his arms and gave him a kiss.”
–First century parable from the lips of Jesus
Long about noon on Saturday a father and son will meet in a giant bear hug far from the horizon that once separated them. And Mom will be there too, just the right touch needed to make a three-corded strand. Perceptive onlookers might catch a glimpse of something arcane and otherworldly in this simple tapestry: a family wrapped, cinched and secured in the keeping power of the Strong-Armed One. I’d call that an unbreakable family bond.
The son is, at long last, coming home. Gone will be the rags and fetters of the far country and, though the memories of depravity and hellishness will linger, the air will be gloriously cleared of the demons that enslaved and harrassed.
I noticed a subtle nuance about that story this afternoon. I found in my Bible, the NASB’s translation of Luke 15:32 to be, “this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live…” The translators took the verb anazoo and made the distinction in it’s aorist tense that a process or action has begun that, if it continues, will certainly end in a completed action or effect.
That’s pretty technical sounding so let me dumb it down for you and me. When I have told others of our son’s return, I (a) do not refer to Graham as a “prodigal” because he no longer wears that moniker by the grace of our Lord, and (b) advise them not to expect our boy to exude an ethereal glow and matching halo. The boy has begun to breathe again the new air of the liberty by which Christ has set him free. He is just now beginning to lay hold of that for which Christ has taken hold of him.
Like me (and you), he will not have “arrived”. He might break our hearts again. (I sure wish there was a verse 33 in that chapter so we could see how it plays out six weeks, six months or six years from the banquet!) He might revert. I pray not, for the scriptural phrase “a dog returning to its vomit” is not such a good thing. It’s deadly, in fact.
All we have is today.
And 15:20.
And verse 32.
And that’s got Mom and me giddy from the word go.
And go we will. To meet our son on a hillside of grace, restoration, reconciliation and…
JUBILEE!
Finally, let me end with this captivating story found in Philip Yancey’s book, What’s So Amazing About Grace? The details might not mirror ours exactly and while it is about a young girl rather than a teenaged boy, you’ll see why I’ve done it.
A young girl grows up on a cherry orchard just above Traverse City, Michigan. Her parents, a bit old- fashioned, tend to overreact to her nose ring, the music she listens to, and the length of her skirts. They ground her a few times, and she seethes inside. “I hate you!” she screams at her father when he knocks on the door of her room after an argument, and that night she acts on a plan she has mentally rehearsed scores of times. She runs away.
She has visited Detroit only once before, on a bus trip with her church youth group to watch the Tigers play. Because newspapers in Traverse City report in lurid detail the gangs, the drugs, and the violence in downtown Detroit, she concludes that is probably the last place her parents will look for her. California, maybe, or Florida, but not Detroit.
Her second day there she meets a man who drives the biggest car she’s ever seen. He offers her a ride, buys her lunch, arranges a place for her to stay. He gives her some pills that make her feel better than she’s ever felt before. She was right all along, she decides: her parents were keeping her from all the fun.
The good life continues for a month, two months, a year. The man with the big car–she calls him “Boss”– teaches her a few things that men like. She lives in a penthouse, and orders room service whenever she wants. Occasionally she thinks about the folks back home, but their lives now seem so boring and provincial that she can hardly believe she grew up there.
She has a brief scare when she sees her picture printed on the back of a milk carton with the headline “Have you seen this child?” But by now she has blond hair, and with all the makeup and body-piercing jewelry she wears, nobody would mistake her for a child. Besides, most of her friends are runaways, and nobody squeals in Detroit.
After a year the first sallow signs of illness appear, and it amazes her how fast the boss turns mean. “These days, we can’t mess around,” he growls, and before she knows it she’s out on the street without a penny to her name. When winter blows in she finds herself sleeping on metal grates outside the big department stores. “Sleeping” is the wrong word–a teenage girl at night in down town Detroit can never relax her guard. Dark bands circle her eyes. Her cough worsens. Continue reading »
Unplugged
27 Friday Jul 2007
Posted in Blogging, Brokenness, Children, Encouragement, Forgiveness, Hope, Loving God, Parenting, Repentance
So…
Where ya been?
The keyword of my life lately has been ‘connect’. That, and the woeful lack thereof, as the case may be. As you are well aware, little is heard from Green Pastures or Sound Bites these days except the plaintive whistling through the hollow reaches of cybersphere and the occasional tumbleweed meandering across your monitor along with the amaranthine chirping of techno-crickets.
I have been beset by mind-cramps, faithful reader, and those incessant mental charley horses have caused me to seize up and rub it out until it goes away.
My Outlook Express has decided to join the mournful processional by going feet-up for the past two weeks. So help me, if I have to look at another ugly window popping up telling me my server has not connected for the past 60 seconds and would I like to wait another 60 seconds, I may be shopping for yet another laptop as this one will be sporting a nice clean 20-gauge grin in its kisser.
No telling how many emails I have idling out there which has given me the uneasy sensation of having my tether ripped free from the mother ship and being slowly drawn far out into collapsing darkness and utter cold. Nooooooo!
All this has me looking for a soccer ball with which I might strike up a friendship and wondering how I’d look in a long, scruffy beard.
Now I find out that my internet browser is giving me the cold shoulder, sharing the news that it has encountered a problem and must shut down and asking me to forgive it for any inconvenience. Again and again. For the past twenty-four hours. You are most definitely not forgiven, Firefox.
All my bookmarks, all those saved articles, every designated folder. Gone. Kablooey. Kaput. With a resigned sigh, I regrettably slump back toward my old nemesis, IE7, and pray it will accept me back into its good graces. Great. Just great.
Welcome, old friend.
Where have you been?
(grinning fiendishly) We knew you’d be back…
Lest you think all in my life has been on disconnect, I need to tell you about a connection that I made recently that trumps all these bloopers rolled into one. This past weekend I spent twenty-four hours with my son who has been away at a school for troubled youth for nearly six months. I haven’t said much about it, and won’t, except to say that our prayers for a jubilee over his life seem to have a strong hearing in Heaven and the recent shifts in the atmosphere tell us that a very significant corner has been turned.
Will it last? Not sure. There may be setbacks and hard miles yet to come, but we have assurance that whatever it is that God wanted to get out of him in this chapter of his young life, He seems to have done just that.
Our life with Graham has consisted of a weekly ten minute phone call and a handful of short visits. It’ll tear your heart out like nothing else when you take your monthly visit and when time’s up, to watch your only child disappear slowly behind the front door of an austere barrack-like building and you drive away, leaving him there, facing a fourteen hour drive home. And all you want to do is call it all off, that this can’t be right, that we can make it work, but knowing every agonizing minute that the battle for his soul requires such sacrifice.
So be it, Lord. Get Your glory in this…
I came within an eyelash of not making July’s visit and, boy, am I glad I listened to God.
Thursday morning, Douglasville, GA.
I lay in bed, sensing the Lord was telling me I needed to go. How can I, Lord? The drive alone will put me back into Shepherd for more skin surgeries. Go. But, Lord, gas is so high. Go. But there’s a special speaker at church this Sunday and I’ll need to introduce him. Go, go, go!
It took some convincing of Sandy to let me do it by myself but we agreed it was right, however I’d need to ask a special favor of the school. I reached for the phone and dialed the all-familiar number. Continue reading »
Seeing Red
11 Wednesday Apr 2007
Educators, you may not want to wear that red blouse on exam day if you want to give your students a fighting chance at passing. According to a recent study done by researchers at the University of Rochester, introducing the color red—even a “hint” or “flash” of it—prior to administering a test can negatively affect your students’ performance.
These researchers have bridged the color red with “avoidance motivation” which means the aesthetic value of the bold color may cause the brain to go into hibernation. Red is associated with danger, blood-letting, stop signs, not to mention that ugly red marker teachers are so fond of using. While red uniforms give a psychological edge in sports, sitting next to a person who is wearing red while taking a test may do anything but.
Here’s what I’m thinking: if you find yourself in a “testy” situation, slug down some Red Bull beforehand because we all know what happens when a bull sees red.
You know, just in case.
99 Balloons
10 Tuesday Apr 2007
Posted in Children, Christianity, Encouragement, God, Hope, Miracles, Parenting, Suffering, Trials
This comes from the files of the “And you thought your trials were hard” department…
“Eliot was born with an undeveloped lung, a heart with a hole in it and DNA that placed faulty information into each and every cell of his body. However, that could not stop the liv
ing God from proclaiming Himself through this boy who never uttered a word.
In the midst of heartbreaking tragedy, the Mooney family found the presence of God strengthening, comforting, and guiding them. Their story reminds us to seek God and endure our struggles rather than blame Him for our hardships.”
(from the Igniter Media Group website)
For the 6-minute video, click here—and be in awe of God’s sustaining grace through this couple’s bittersweet journey of hardship and discovering God’s all-sufficiency through it all.
Do It Again!
05 Thursday Apr 2007
Posted in Children, Christianity, God, Loving God, Miracles
The following is a famous quote from G.K.Chesterton, Christian philosopher and apologist. It succinctly captures the creative and redemptive ways of God—Our Heavenly Father whose heart is stamped with the eternal playfulness and reckless abandon of a child!
A child kicks its legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony.
But perhaps God is strong enough… It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again,” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again,” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike: it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.
Imagine also, the profound glee of the Father as He mirthfully wills the Holy Spirit to draw another seeking soul to Life in His Son: “Do it again!”
And again.
And again.
Our Lord just loves the miracle of resurrection…
For the choir director. A Psalm of David.
I waited patiently for the LORD; And He inclined to me and heard my cry.
He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.
He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear And will trust in the LORD.
How blessed is the man who has made the LORD his trust, And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood.
Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders which You have done, (Do it again!) And Your thoughts toward us; There is none to compare with You. If I would declare and speak of them, They would be too numerous to count.
Psalm 40:1-5
A Sign Of Things To Come…
20 Tuesday Mar 2007
The United Church of Soccer
18 Sunday Mar 2007
Posted in Children, Christianity, Church, Culture, Parenting
I’ll probably get some stern looks and cold shoulders for posting this, but, hey, I just calls it likes I sees it, even though I didn’t write it. But I should have.
Pardon me while I go check to see if I have any guts…
_________________________________
“THE NEW FAMILY TRUMP CARD” (Family Time v Church Time)
by Albert Mohler (www.albertmohler.com)
Is “family time” encroaching on “church time?” Leadership, a publication in the Christianity Today family of magazines, surveyed 490 pastors last year, asking them about church life and family. A major theme — parents are taking their kids to soccer games rather than to church.
The soccer games are only an illustration, of course, but team sports loom larger and larger in the lives of many kids and families, often leaving little time for anything else.
From the Leadership report:
The phenomenon of overprogrammed kids in the last decade or so is well documented–to the point of satire. (A recent sitcom showed an alien begging off an invasion of Earth because his kid had “a thing.”) What isn’t so well documented is the effect this legion of extracurricular activities has on church life.
The pastors we surveyed report the overall busyness of families is keeping families away from church. Asked whether people are spending more discretionary time on family activities or church commitments, 76 percent said the scale tipped toward family activities. This contrasts with the perception of 62 percent of respondents that a generation ago, free time was more likely spent on church commitments. The balance has shifted.
(Read more)
